This blog contains the materials for my Face|Resection project. All materials are free to view and download. Please feel free to use and disseminate as desired, but please make sure to credit me (and preferably link to the hosting site). I want this resource to be available and helpful, but being properly credited for its public use is incredibly important as both a freelancer and as a person making a living as adjunct faculty.

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Clint
McCallum's Bowel
Resection is
a solo trombone work from 2011 that takes the concepts from the
circular breathing and articulation sections and the pushes them to
their limits while demanding a stable execution. This section
explores the practical application, and expansion, of the previous
exercises in the frame work of McCallum's solo.

The defining challenge of Bowel
Resection
is the fact that it presents a singular demand- the work is a single
split-tone, sustained for six and half minutes, that is constantly
altered, but never broken. The piece takes this single sound and
requires that the trombonist circular breathe and rapidly double
tongue while slowly stretching the split-tone down the slide. It is a
work that requires a mastery of both of these skills, while also
demanding that the trombonist maintain an intensely focused sound,
for an extended period, while she plays multiple techniques that
cause one's sound to spread.

Bowel
Resection
is a work that explores the physical limits of the musician by
exploiting a single sound, but the sound created by this act can
create an illusion of stasis that can undermine the desired result.
Therefore, an additional challenge for the trombonist is to maintain
utter stability while still clearly asserting her human existence and
struggle into the work's aural fabric. The performer must break away
from the piece's potential to fall into a glacial stability that is
conceptually divorced from the physical demands of the performer.

The
importance of this issue is underlined by McCallum's program note for
the Face|Resection
EP:

When
Matt Barbier premiered Bowel Resection in 2014 a majority of the
audience assumed there was electronic processing involved. This was
due partly to the rich sonic complexity his split-tones, but mostly
because he never took a breath. Transitioning between split-tones
while at a loud dynamic and circular breathing is an inhuman (and
inhumane?) task. In fact, when I wrote the piece I wasn't sure that
it was physically possible. After the performance I revealed that
there had been no electronic processing, that what we had all just
heard was someone circular breathing a split-tone for seven minutes.
People were shocked. This experience at the premiere me concerned as
we approached this project. If people assumed it was electronic in a
live situation, how were we going to preserve the physicality of the
performance that is so important to the piece when we create a
recorded version? To me, all of the distinguishing aspects of the
piece—insistence, an engulfing spectrum of sound, a blurriness
that thwarts the perception of proportion and hence the formal sense
of time, the bizarre instrumental mechanics, the physical extremity
of the instrumental technique—all invite a vivid imagining of what
is happening both inside of the trombone and inside of the
trombonist's body. This is imagining is a sort of empathetic
transcendence of both space and subject. If we hear Bowel Resection
as electronic music it loses that sense of gravitational pull
towards some (imagined) body. Then again, this zero-g approach could
be a completely valid way to listen to the piece. And perhaps what
is so exciting about this recording is that you can now listen to
the piece in many different ways. But Matt's brief, convulsive
sniffs should, on some level, continue to return you to the mystery
of his struggling body.

Expanding
upon McCallum's ending focus, much like in facesplitter,
the act of circular breathing is an import musical tool for the form
and function of the work. However, unlike facesplitter's
mechanically regulated breathing scheme, the need for humanization
[and the practical execution of what is required] in Bowel
Resection suggests rapid,
convulsive patches of breaths. Irregular, desperate attempts to fill
one's lungs anchor the work in the sound of a human body and make the
breath a constant and intrinsic part of the work's framework. On the
side of practical execution, the longer the breath one takes, the
higher the probability one has of destabilizing and losing the
split-tone. Therefore, multiple short and rapid breaths help a player
maintain focus on the center of his embouchure, while also adding an
important sonic parameter to the work.

An
additional issue found with early performances of Bowel
Resection is that as one
continued the glissando into the further reaches of the slide the
written ff dynamic
could not be maintained because of the nature of the lower 3:2
split-tones. Another problem is that the lower end of the glissando
requires a wider aperture to maintain a full tone which will
potentially destabilize the split-tone, particularly when combined
with the destabilizing effects of circular breathing and rapid
articulations. This destabilization, combined with a registeraly
created decrescendo, creates an anti-climactic drop in energy for the
work's second half. A solution found to counteract this problem is to
utilize common-tone slurs. This causes deviation from the score, but
one that is approved by the composer.

Common-tone
slurs, like circular breathing, can serve a dual function in this
work by providing assistance with practical execution while also
providing sonic material that promotes the composer's conceptual
desire for humanistic clarity. By utilizing common-tone slurs to
transition between 3:2 and 4:3 split-tones, one is able increase,
rather than lose, intensity over the second half of the work, while
also enacting hard shifts in harmony which break an illusion of sonic
stasis. In doing so, the trombonist is able to shift the listener's
focus and bring him into the body and mechanics of the performance,
while maintaining the standing wave of the work.

Practical
Application of Concepts

In
this next section the practical applications of these concepts will
be explored in relation to the previous exercises and specific
examples from the Bowel
Resection score.
The score is included here for reference with the permission of the
composer.

McCallum's
notation and instruction is much less exacting than that contained in
facesplitter.
This allows the work to have a certain degree of flexibility in
execution. While the form and shape of the score is clear, the
flexibility of certain parameters allows for the work to be shaped to
push the limits of the individual performer while still remaining
Bowel Resection.

The
score contains the instruction, “sempre
split-tone (circular breathe)” without
specifying which partials are split, although it does imply a 4:3
split-tone from the written Bb. For the purpose of the author's own
playing strengths and practical concerns, the partials split on the
recording and in live performance are a 3:2 split-tone. This was
chosen for practicality and security. Given the extreme modifications
required, the flexibility of the 3rd
partial on the trombone and its conducive nature to the techniques
involved made it a more practical candidate for the demands of the
work. Another reason for the choice is the inherent stability of a
3:2 split-tone. In consideration of the fact that the next split-tone
down the overtone series requires a sizable embouchure shift, this
helps reduce the danger of the performer, because of fatigue, losing
muscular focus and dropping down a partial. With a much less
malleable 4:3 split-tone, this possibility is much greater, therefore
a 3:2 split-tone was selected increase control and to make the other
technical modifications more exact.

One
of these modifications is McCallum's desire for a specified shift
between “complex”
[noise
based] split-tone and more clarity in the timbre of the dyad being
split. In discussion with the composer, what was stated as important
is not that an exact distinction is made between a complex and
dyad-based split-tone, but that the performer utilizes two distinct
timbres of split-tone. For this specific issue the choice was made to
have a shift in phoneme to change the overtone spectrum of the sound.
For the “complex”
timbre, which is the bulk of the work, a basic “o” phoneme was
chosen. This allows the maximum amount of information into the sound
while remaining closest to traditional playing, which allows for a
greater amount of stability while maintaining a comfortable level of
focus inside the mouthpiece. For the more sporadic dyad sections, it
was decided to utilize a closed “e” phoneme, which filters out a
significant portion of the sound, therefore creating the impression
of a dyad. The additional function of this choice is that, while the
“e” phoneme is taxing to maintain for long periods, it comes from
over-focusing the embouchure. This over-focus brings a much needed
stability inside the mouthpiece periodically throughout the work,
which helps maintain an unbroken split-tone.

An
additional modification suggested by the composer relates to
pragmatic demands of circular breathing for such an extended period.
McCallum allows for the player to add fermati where he requires more
time to breathe. This allows the performer to extend certain notes
and create patches of breath, which assists in creating space in
which this aural portion of the work can exist. Much like the opening
phrase of facesplitter,
it is recommended to include this aspect earlier and more regularly
than initially needed at the beginning of the work to both normalize
the sound and stake its claim in the aural fabric.

The
final modification mentioned in this section is the utilization of
common-tone slurs between split-tones. The interpretations involved
in this project involves two common-tone slurs and both correspond
with changes in direction of glissando. The author found that his 3:2
split-tones began to lose power and focus past the D/G, 3:2
split-tone. The solution found, with the composer, is to utilize the
[almost] common-tone at m. 81. Shifting between a D/G 3:2 split-tone
to a D/A 4:3, by utilizing the tenor-bass valve, creates a massive
boost in both volume and intensity at the point where the authors
limit of control was being reached. The shift between the two
split-tones also creates an illusion of chord shift from I to V. This
harmonic shift, combined with an increase in intensity, creates a
strong deviation at a point where the work begins to bring the
listener into a sense of stasis.

At
the point of this shift, the glissando is reversed in direction while
the same slide proportions are maintained. By doing this the
performer is able to further break any feeling of stasis while more
reliably increasing intensity. At the height of the glissando, the
performer reverses the process and releases the tenor-bass valve at
the end of m. 152. This creates an common-tone slur from the F/C 4:3
split-tone to a F/Bb 3:2 split-tone. The reversal creates an
impression of a V to I resolution and modifies the timbre from a more
direct and aggressive 4:3 split-tone to a wider 3:2. These aspects
encourage a further deviation from any illusion of stasis and assist
in presenting a larger formal direction to the listener. In the
author's performances, at this point mm. 153-159 are repeated while a
long glissando down to 7th
position [B/E 3:2split-tone] is executed to create a longer coda and
provide the full visual and sonic effect of a tritone glissando.

One
challenge not yet discuss are practice techniques for combining
circular breathing and multiple tonguing concepts as well as
practical solutions for building the strength and focus necessary for
the work. A basic approach for the first issue is simply to modify
the articulation exercise on page 21 by adding circular breathing to
it.

Sequence
down by position, like previous exercise.

This
process is obviously contingent on the trombonist being completely
comfortable both the original exercise and circular breathing, as
covered in the previous sections. For the author, the next step was
to take this exercise and continue it by removing the first and last
two bars and utilizing glissandi to sequence through positions
involved in Bowel
Resection
to create a controlled practice of the piece. It is recommended to
not sequence by full position, but by quarter step or smaller. One
should start with only first position. Once that is comfortable, add
a small glissando and repeat the exercise. Continue this process by
slowly increasing the number of cycles while methodically covering
all parts of the slide utilized in Bowel
Resection. This
meticulous process forces a player to familiarize herself with his
own tendencies and pitfalls. Concentrate on maintaining focus and
center in one's sound and mind. Pay careful attention to small habits
that lead to losing the split-tone or unbearable discomfort. Try to
find the point not where they affect the production, but where these
issues actually start. By slowly and deliberately covering the entire
surface of the work, one must search for these issues at their root-
not their growth. Bowel
Resection
is a long work that's success hinges on the eradication of
inefficiencies before they are physically perceptible. Once the
player realizes a problem has arisen, it is often too late to correct
it given that utter stability must be maintained for the work to
receive a successful performance.

In
this process, the places that the split-tone is lost in this exercise
often corresponds with where the split-tone is lost in performance.
By taking time to deliberately find one's weak points divorced from
the piece, one can learn the personal, physical habits and warning
signs that frequently lead to failure or success in an unstable work.

While
Bowel Resection
presents a host of challenges and pitfalls, it is a work well worth
the undertaking. It is a work that creates an extreme instability but
is not intended to be a work of failure. It is a piece that demands
the individual performer find the edge of his own limits and not
surpass them. One must hold themselves on that edge and move neither
forward or back. She must remain stable and motionless while
simultaneously avoiding stasis. Of works exploring severe physical
limits, Bowel
Resection
is largely unique in the fact that it allows itself to be molded to
the performer. It finds a way to push an individual trombonist to his
bodily limit while still maintaining a cohesion and form that clearly
makes it Clint McCallum's work.